Wallace injury only ‘a niggle’, says coach
The outstanding back-row forward retired at half-time in Saturday’s 44-7 romp over Treviso at the Stadio Di Monigo with a calf muscle strain. Munster coach Tony McGahan described the injury as ‘a niggle’ and that Wallace was replaced as ‘a precautionary measure’.
Wallace is a crucial cog in the Munster set-up, more so because of the long term injury sustained by Denis Leamy.
The medics will work overtime over the next few days given the quick turnaround and that Wallace has had only 40 minutes of game time since December 20.
The one certainty about Friday is that Northampton will provide far stiffer opposition than the hapless Italians on Saturday. The game was over as a contest after six minutes by which stage the flying Keith Earls had made the running fora superb try by the excellent Denis Hurley and then scored the second after a break by Doug Howlett. Ronan O’Gara missed both conversions but once he decided to get in on the act,it was only a matter of how much Munster would win by.
The rout continued in the 11th minute when Wallace tore down the left wing before delivering a perfect pass inside to Donncha O’Callaghan who gleefully raced in from 20 metres. O’Gara added the extras and then banged over a penalty to make it 20-0 within the first quarter hour. Treviso forced a few close range penalties and scrums and referee Chris White might well have awarded them a penalty try on at least one occasion. Instead, he gave a relieving penalty to the hard pressed visitors who also defended adequately until Tomás O’Leary’s pass was intercepted by flanker Alessandro Zanni who sprinted home unopposed for a gifted try.
Marius Goosen converted but little more was seen of the Italians.
The hosts were back under the cosh again when O’Gara thumped over a 47 metre penalty before Paul Warwick came up with a delightful little solo effort as he jinked past a few tackles, chipped ahead and gathered the kindly bouncing ball for the bonus point try. O’Gara converted and Munster went in leading 30 points to 7.
The Red Army made up at least half the crowd and happily belted out the “Fields of Athenry” and “Stand Up and Fight”, satisfied that their heroes had already completed their task.
Individually and collectively, they were far too good for the Italians whose national coach, Nick Mallett, would have looked on and wondered what hope his side had in the forthcoming Six Nations if this was the best the leading club team in the country could offer.
The speed and strength of Munster centres Earls and Jean de Villiers made it a miserable afternoon for Albert Sgarbi and Gonzalo Garcia, both members of the national squad. Howlett and Hurley on the wings were given the opportunity to show their paces and revelled. Warwick looked a class act at full-back while O’Gara and O’Leary at half-back were always on the alert.
Obviously, this wouldn’t have been the case had the forwards not been lording it over the opposition. The Treviso pack had seen off Perpignan and frightened the lives out of Northampton on this ground but this time they were bullied and dominated from the outset. Fears about recent inactivity were proved groundless and with the possible exception of the scrummage area, it was Munster all the way.
The line-out was especially fruitful with Paul O’Connell, O’Callaghan and Alan Quinlan having a field day while Wallace and Niall Ronan were everywhere in loose play. It was a deeply impressive 40 minutes of rugby by Munster, even allowing for the disappointing nature of the resistance posed by Treviso. At times, though, it looked little more than a training spin and although McGahan and Donncha O’Callaghan later insisted it wasn’t a case of his players taking their foot off the pedal, it certainly looked like it as the quality of play deteriorated drastically. Two more tries followed, the first on 63 minutes created for Earls by a de Villiers break, and the second at the death by replacement Donnacha Ryan. O’Gara and Warwick landed a conversion apiece. It was far from a memorable 40 minutes of rugby as the players’ minds had moved on six days and to another massive Thomond Park occasion.
MUNSTER: P Warwick, D Howlett, K Earls, J de Villiers, D Hurley, R O’Gara, T O’Leary, W du Preez, D Fogarty, J Hayes, D O’Callaghan, P O’Connell (c), A Quinlan, N Ronan, D Wallace.
Replacements: J. Coughlan for Wallace (ht); D. Ryan and P. Stringer for Quinlan and O’Leary, (both 60); D. Varley for Fogarty (63); L. Mafi for O’Gara (64); I. Dowling for Hurley (65); T. Buckley and J. Brugnaut for Hayes and du Preez (72).
BENETTON TREVISO: L McLean, A Vilk, A Sgarbi, G Garcia, B de Jager, M Goosen, S Picone, M Rizzo, L Ghiraldini, I Fernandez Rouyet, A Pavanello, C van Zyl, B Vermaak A Zanni, D Kingi.
Replacements: T. Botes for Goosen (47); A. Allori and P. Di Santon for Rizzo and Fernandez Rouyet (50); D. Vidal for Ghiraldini (60); E. Pavanello for A. Pavanello (74).
Referee: Chris White (England).
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